MADISON — A conservative legal foundation sued a Democratic state representative Thursday for declining to turn over electronic copies of his emails under the state’s open records law and instead seeking more than $3,000 for printed copies of them.

Collin Roth, a researcher with the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, in July asked Brostoff under the records law for electronic copies of emails related to occupational licensing, an area of regulation that the institute, known as WILL, has been seeking to overhaul.

An aide to Brostoff in December told Roth he would need to pay $3,240 to receive printed copies of thousands of pages of emails.

A lawyer for Roth emphasized that he wanted electronic copies of the emails and noted that in January a Dane County judge ruled Rep. Scott Krug (R-Nekoosa) had to provide records in an electronic format to a reporter.

Brostoff declined to provide the records and WILL sued late Thursday, according to a copy of the lawsuit provided by WILL.

Brostoff’s “denial is arbitrary and capricious, as he was informed that this court had already ruled that state representatives must provide electronic records in electronic format, yet he continued to deny (Roth’s) request,” WILL attorney Thomas Kamenick wrote in the complaint.